The next chapter begins in the history of American championship car racing, as the much-anticipated 2018 season of the Verizon IndyCar Series kicks off on the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida!

The six months of off-season that have passed since Josef Newgarden was crowned the IndyCar champion at Sonoma Raceway have left a lot of time for developments in driver lineups, sponsorship arrangements, and perhaps the most significant change to the series; the introduction of the universal aerokit. IndyCar and its partners have spent the previous couple of years working to produce a car that reduces overall downforce and transfers much of what remains from the body to the undertray, and in doing so, a) puts greater emphasis on driver talent, b) produces more competitive races, and c) allows for a streamlined look that pays homage to cars of the past. Consensus among drivers, analysts, and fans says that they succeeded in the departments of looks and downforce reduction, but only time will tell what changes may be seen regarding the on-track product.

On to this weekend's race, the streets of St. Pete will be hosting its 15th Champ Car/IndyCar race on Sunday. The curbs that were added to the turn 3 complex last year have been removed, returning the circuit to its traditional layout. An entry list of 24 cars includes all of the new teams that will be contesting anywhere from six races to the full schedule this year. With Hélio Castroneves now racing in IMSA, Will Power enters the weekend as the only driver on the grid with multiple wins here (with two in total), and local resident Sébastian Bourdais, racing once more in the Coyne car #18, enters as the defending winner, having scored a popular victory last year after starting the race from last-place. The only other two drivers racing this weekend to have won this race are Graham Rahal (2008) and James Hinchcliffe (2013).

For those who have not been following the silly season closely, I have attempted to briefly outline the major changes to the grid for the new season.

Spoiler:

In regards to teams, Harding Racing and Carlin have joined the grid with championship efforts for one and two cars, respectively. Juncos Racing and Michael Shank Racing will each be fielding a single car on a partial schedule, including here at St. Pete. Team Penske has downsized from four full-time cars to three, Chip Ganassi Racing has downsized from four cars to two, and Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing expands from one car to two.

In regards to drivers, the most notable absence is certainly that of Hélio Castroneves, the three-time Indianapolis 500 champion who is still racing for Team Penske, but in an IMSA prototype with co-driver Ricky Taylor (Hélio will fortunately still be racing in IndyCar's Indy GP and the 500). Conor Daly and Carlos Muñoz were released from A. J. Foyt Enterprises after only one season, each, with the team, and J.R. Hildebrand has been let go by Ed Carpenter Racing after only his third full-time season in a span of seven years.

New to the grid are Matheus Leist of Brazil, Robert Wickens of Canada, and Zach Veach of the USA on a full-time basis, driving for Foyt, Schmidt Peterson Motorsports, and Andretti Autosport, respectively. A number of rookies will contest partial schedules. After a handful of races last year, Jack Harvey is back and in the new Michael Shank car (a team which purchased the chassis that they are using in 2012). René Binder and defending Indy Lights champion Kyle Kaiser will split the new Juncos car (with Binder racing this weekend). Formula 2 driver Jordan King was convinced by Alexander Rossi to give IndyCar a try and is now the road course specialist for the ECR car #20. And Dale Coyne Racing's car #19, vacated by an unexpected departure of Ed Jones for the Ganassi car #10, will be shared between Zachary Claman DeMelo and Pietro Fittipaldi.

Spencer Pigot has been promoted to a full-time drive in ECR's car #21, Gabby Chaves returns for his first full-time season since 2015 with Harding, Tony Kanaan takes over the famed car #14 at Foyt, Charlie Kimball and Max Chilton have moved together from Ganassi to Carlin, Takuma Sato has reunited with RLL to drive an upgraded second-car for the team alongside Graham Rahal, and Alexander Rossi and Marco Andretti have swapped cars within the Andretti camp, with Rossi now piloting the #27 and Marco piloting the Andretti-Herta #98.

New cars, new sponsors, and hopefully some more new fans, as well. Ten years removed from the year in which American open-wheel racing reunited, things are looking up for the sport. I'm very excited to see what changes will be seen and where the sport will go as we continue the unending march into the future. But for the moment, it's simply time to go racing!

Coverage begins at 12:30 P.M. EST on ABC.

Last edited by SpeedDemon37 on Fri Mar 09, 2018 6:06 pm; edited 2 times in total

What a race! It's always great to start the season off with a good one, and I feel that we got our fair share of thrills (and spills) to kick off 2018!

Ben Atkins wrote:Rossi went for the win. Every other driver in the field would have done the same thing. The hate he's going for literally going for the win is just downright unnecessary.

Great win for Seabass and Dale Coyne though! Always great to see them in victory circle!

100% agreed. We saw all weekend long just how skiddish that these cars were under braking for turn 1. Rossi's only chance required him to risk the car stepping out from under him, and it just plain didn't work. I'm sure that he doesn't feel good about the outcome, but when you're going for the win, it's all too easy to overstep the boundary of control.

Either way, it's a terrible shame for Wickens. He drove marvelously all weekend, and even though he's showcased plenty of talent elsewhere before this year, I admittedly was not expecting a P1 Award and a race-winning drive in his very first try. Sam Schmidt's big off-season shakeup appears to be paying off already, and with a couple of very talented drivers at the wheel, we will definitely be seeing them contend for more wins.

And finally, congratulations to Sébastien Bourdais!!! A hometown win for Bourdais, a win for Dale Coyne Racing, and all for the second year in a row! Considering how trying that the second half of the previous year was for both Bourdais (with the crash during qualifying for the 500) and Coyne (with many expensive cars wrecked and destroyed), today's victory is certainly one that they all could have used all the more, I'm sure. I sincerely hope that, this time around, good fortunes will come their way throughout the season!

Also of note, over the previous two years, the average finish for the driver who started from the final position on the grid is 1.5.

Late response here, but that was a stellar way to start off the Indycar season. Felt terrible for Wickens, but Rossi went for the win and that's just how it works out sometimes. Also, I love how these new cars drive and how it looks like they're a bit more of a handful.